The present invention relates to method of measuring a line edge roughness of micro objects in scanning microscopes. The method can be used for a quality control of very small objects by a scanning electron microscope and particularly in an in-process inspection of photoresistive and other ULSI features in the semiconductor industry.
It is important to determine a line edge roughness for such objects as elements of integral circuits or details of photoresist masks, in a scanning electron microscope. The reason is that the line edge roughness of some micro objects in particular elements of integral circuits significantly affect parameters and reliability of operation of the device as a whole. The method to roughly determine the line edge roughness of such objects by visually examining them in electron microscope is known. However, this method cannot be considered as accurate.